Note: This story has been updated with comments from Howard Marlowe.
After more than three decades as the American League of Lobbyists, the U.S. lobbying industry’s leading trade group in Washington, D.C., is one step away from making an often-stigmatized job a word non grata in its name.
The League’s board has recommended to the group’s 1,300 members that they adopt the Association of Government Relations Professionals as the organization’s new name, it announced Tuesday [PDF]. League President Monte Ward said in a statement that the decision to change the name came after the group found that “a majority of our membership no longer identified themselves as ‘only lobbyists.’ ” Many of the organization’s members consider lobbying “ just a fraction” of their duties, he said.
“We’re very excited about this evolutionary change to our association, and look forward to serving more effectively all our current and future members,” Ward said.
The League has had a troubled relationship with the word “lobbyists” since the group was founded in 1979.
Even in the League’s early years, some members pushed for the group to remove lobbyists from its name, saying that the term hurts the organization’s efforts to increase the professionalism of the lobbying industry. But then, and at other points in its history, the group’s membership has “rejected overwhelmingly the notion of running away” from the word, according to the group’s history.
“Whatever its origin, the term now stands for a profession—a profession that exercises, and assists others in exercising, the rights of free speech and petitioning government embodied in the first amendment,” the organization history says. “League members determined that enhancing the standing and reputation of lobbyists lay not in a change of terminology but in the sponsorship of meetings, events, programs, and most importantly, a set of standards that enhance the professionalism of lobbyists.”
Former lobbyist Jack Abramoff said it’s “quite ironic” of the League to change its name after fighting to keep it for 34 years. Abramoff has become a vocal critic of the lobbying industry and supporter for ethics reform since 2010, after he finished a three-and-a-half-year prison sentence for bribery, fraud, and tax evasion stemming from the influence-peddling scandal that made him a front-page fixture.
The name change would help the group, Abramoff said. But government relations professionals still are lobbyists, he said.
“It’s all euphemisms,” Abramoff said.
Howard Marlowe, who preceded Ward as the League’s president, was the sole board member against a new name for the organization, according to The Hill, which first reported last month that the group was considering a rebranding. In addition to the Association of Government Relations Professionals, The National Association of Government Relations Professionals and the Government Relations Professionals Association were leading candidates for the new name at the time.
Marlowe said the new name came after an uphill battle to encourage more of the League’s members who do government advocacy work to register with Congress as lobbyists. More than half of the group’s members aren’t registered, he noted.
The name change is “entirely about the stigma” associated with the word lobbyist, Marlowe said. The League’s new name covers a “very undefined group of people,” moving the organization’s focus away from the lobbying profession, he said, adding “It’s one way to avoid the mud.”
Although the League is moving closer to axing the word “lobbyists” from its name, the group is planning to have “lobbying” in its tagline. The board approved “Voice of the Lobbying, Public Policy and Advocacy Professions” as its motto.
“Let there be no doubt, we will always retain the missions of defining and defending the role of lobbyists, of protecting everyone’s First Amendment rights to ‘seek redress of grievances,’ and of leading the way to ensuring that our colleagues adhere to the highest ethical standards,” Ward said.
